Night Music

Painting by Frank Frazetta


Night Music

She sits on the mountain
that is her home
and the landscapes slide away.
One goes down
and then up to the monastery.
One drops away to a winnowing ring
and a farmhouse where a girl
and her mother are hanging the laundry.
There’s a tiny port in the distance
where the shore reaches the water.
She is numb and clear because
of the grieving in that world.
She thinks of the bandits
and soldiers who return to the places
they have destroyed.
Who plant trees and build walls
and play music in the village square
evening after evening,
believing the mothers of the boys
they killed
and the women they raped
will eventually come out
of the white houses
in their black dresses
to sit with their children
and the old.
Will listen to the music
with unreadable eyes.


Linda Gregg

Posted over on Poetry Foundation